At least 27 people were killed in China’s Muslim-majority province of Xinjiang on Wednesday, July 26, in deadly riots seen as a result of Chinese oppression of the Muslim minority in the region.
“The cause of today’s incident is from the continuous oppression and incitement from the Chinese government,” Dilxat Rexit, a Sweden-based spokesman for the
World Uyghur Congress, told Los Angeles Times.
State media said the fatalities occurred when knife-wielding mobs attacked police stations and a local government building in the remote township of Lukqun, about 200 km (120 miles) southeast of Urumqi.
“Seventeen people had been killed… before police opened fire and shot dead 1
0 rioters,” Xinhua news agency said, citing local officials.
The mobs were also “stabbing at people and setting fire to police cars”, the report said.
The agency said nine police or security guards and eight civilians were kille
d before police opened fire.
Three other people were taken to hospital with injuries.
The unrest is the deadliest since 2009 when nearly 200 people were killed
in deadly riots in the province.
Chinese authorities have convicted about 200 people, mostly Uighurs, over the riots and sentenced 26 of them to death.
Uighur Muslims are a Turkish-speaking minority of eight million in the
northwestern Xinjiang region.
Xinjiang, which activists call East Turkestan, has been autonomou
s since 1955 but continues to be the subject of massive security crackdowns
by Chinese authorities.
Rights groups accuse Chinese authorities of religious repression against Uighur Muslims in Xinjiang in the name of counter terrorism.
Oppression
Uighur activists have called for the intervention of the international community to change policies on the Muslim community.
“To avoid this kind of instability, the international community should pressure China to abandon the policies that have led to the current crisis,” Rexit said.
Uighur Muslims complain of religious and cultural repression by Chinese authorities, and the region is regularly hit by unrest.
Chinese authorities have often blamed clashes in the region on “terrorists”, but initial state-media reports did not mention terrorism.
A verified Twitter account run by state-broadcaster CCTV called the violence a “riot”, saying it was correcting an earlier message which described it as an “insurgent attack”.
Muslims accuses the government of settling millions of ethnic Han in their territory with the ultimate goal of obliterating its identity and culture.
Analysts say the policy of transferring Han Chinese to Xinjiang to consolidate Beijing’s authority has increased the proportion of Han in the region from five percent in the 1940s to more than 40 percent now.
Beijing views the vast region of Xinjiang as an invaluable asset because of its crucial strategic location near Central Asia and its large oil and gas reserves.
